


Rubber Ducky

by INKQueen



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Bathing, Damian is written to seem younger than he is in canon, Fluff, Gen, i just want him to have a childhood okay!?, just regular bathing, not sexy bathing, sue me, the rest of the batfam get mentions, y'all need to get your minds outta the gutter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-21
Updated: 2018-04-21
Packaged: 2019-04-25 15:15:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14381352
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/INKQueen/pseuds/INKQueen
Summary: Alfred needs to get Damian to take a bath.





	Rubber Ducky

“Master Damian --”

“No!”

Alfred sighed. It had slipped his mind once more that young Master Damian was very much that -- young. Young enough that overstimulation and tiredness could still cause tantrums, however much he’d been trained out of them.

“Please, Master Damian, the gala is in an hour, and I fear for that chandelier. It really hasn’t been the same since Master Richard -- “

“I refuse!”

Damian was tangled up in the chandelier, ten feet above Alfred’s head, perching like an angry cat, still in his grimy Robin’s uniform. Normally, Alfred would have recruited Dick as back up in his case -- Damian really would do anything for his older brother -- but Dick was in Bludhaven tonight. So it was up to Alfred.

Alfred put on his most reasonable tone of voice. “Master Damian, you haven’t changed your clothes in twenty-four hours since last night’s patrol, and you spent all of this afternoon training. You cannot go to the gala like that. Please come down and take a bath.”

“No, Father promised I could patrol again this evening.”

“Master Bruce will be at the gala as well, after which we can discuss patrol tonight. He is currently getting cleaned up and you should too.”

Damian’s face scrunched up, sensing Alfred’s reluctance to confirm that he would be allowed out as Robin tonight with his father.

“NO!”

Alfred sighed again. He should have known reason wouldn’t work. Though Damian was usually such a reasonable child, Alfred was quite sure he hadn’t slept last night. The combination of this with the overstimulation of a gala, three open cases and a nearly full house -- Tim, Cassandra, Duke, Harper, Stephanie, and Selina were all present -- was making Damian very recalcitrant. 

Alfred tried a different tactic. “Master Damian, if you come down and allow me to bathe you, I shall tell you a story about Master Richard and show you something special.”

Damian peered down suspiciously, evidently deciding whether it would be worth it, his face smudged all over with dirt. He looked so much like Master Richard had at much the same age.

“Okay.” Damian vaulted from chandelier to the staircase railing and then waited, pouting, while Alfred came up the stairs to join him.

Placing his hands on his young charges shoulders, Alfred lead Damian to one of the smaller bathrooms in the house, the one closest to Dick’s old room. Inside it was warmly lit, with a regular sized tub on short clawed feet, as opposed the bathtub half the size of a pool that occupied the bathroom connected to Bruce’s room. 

Alfred ran the water, checked the temperature, then went to go get some supplies, hoping that Damian wouldn’t vanish in the meantime. When he returned with a ridiculously fluffy towel and a small bottle, he found Damian still sitting on the tile floor, fiddling with the hem of his costume.

“To properly tell this story, we must set the scene,” Alfred said, waving the bottle he’d brought in front of Damian’s nose.

The boy frowned. “What’s that?”

Alfred smiled. “Bubble bath.”

A look of annoyance and curiosity crossed Damian’s face. “I hardly think that’s necessary for cleanliness, Pennyworth.”

“Perhaps not,” Alfred replied noncommittally, before removing his jacket, rolling up his sleeves, and tipping the end of the bottle into the running tap.

A rare look of wonder broke over Damian’s face as mountains of bubbles began piling up at one end of the tub. Everything stayed just like that for a few more moments; Damian staring wide-eyed at the bubbles, the faucet roaring, Alfred pretending to be concentrating on the water while really watching his young charge, the small crackling of popping foam.

Then the tub was full and Alfred switched the water off.

“Now, let’s get you out of this filthy costume.”

A good-natured tussle ensued, Alfred trying to pull pieces of the Robin outfit off of Damian as dramatically as possible with large flourishes, and Damian trying to be as annoyed and reluctant as possible, flopping about like a rag doll. Eventually, Damian was in the tub, little more than a head on top of the bobbing mounds of bubbles.

“Alright Pennyworth, I was promised a story.”

Alfred smiled indulgently and went to the bathroom cupboard. He grabbed something from the top shelf. He held it out on an open palm for Damian to see.

It was a rubber duck, about the size of a softball and wearing a Batman mask and cape. Damian quirked an eyebrow before gentle plucking the duck from Alfred’s palm and examining it in among the bubbles. Alfred settled himself on the floor at the edge of the tub, his crisp black suit wrinkling up to match the corners of his eyes.

“Once, when Master Dick was younger than you are now, he refused to bathe for an entire week. He and Master Bruce had an encounter with Killer Croc, and afterwards, Master Dick became so frightened of the bathtub drain that he refused to bathe.”

Damian smirked. “How ridiculous. Grayson should have known there is no way Killer Croc could fit into the pipes in the manor.”

Alfred nodded absently, grabbing a washcloth off the rack and dunking it in the water. He started scrubbing at the dirt on the boy’s face, despite the growling it elicited from Damian.

“Of course boys cannot go a week without bathing, particularly if they are training all day and leaping across the roofs of Gotham all night” --  Damian scowled at the pointed remark -- “so Master Bruce purchased a Batman bath kit. A collectible edition, from some of the earliest Batman merchandise available. This is the duck from that set. Master Dick wouldn’t take a bath without it until he was, oh, twelve or thirteen.”

Damian regarded the duck, seeming pleased with this family heirloom. He rubbed his head where Alfred had been scrubbing with a bubbly hand.

Alfred’s mustache twitched. “Master Damian, I feel it my duty to inform you that you have ears.”

Damian frowned. “Well of course I have ears, Pennyworth, it isn’t as if I’ve lost them…”

He trailed off when Alfred grabbed a hand mirror from a nearby drawer and showed the boy his reflection. Bubbles draped down the sides and back of his head with twin foam peaks on top -- Damian had a bubbly facsimile of his father’s cowl.

The boy’s face split into a grin and a sound erupted from his mouth that was so unlike Damian that it took Alfred a moment to discern that it was a giggle.  Damian immediately scrunched down in the tub, drawing the bubbles about him to obscure his face and squinched up his eyes.

“I am the Bubble Knight!” He declared through the foam before he dissolved into cackling laughter. Alfred began chuckling as well.

“Look, look, Pennyworth, I’m you!” Damian scooped the bubbles off his head and reapplied them under his nose and on his chin, sticking his nose in the air. At that moment, Damian slipped from his position on the slippery bottom of the tub and fell splashing into the soapy water. The water sloshed about, some of it escaping the tub and onto Alfred. Damian struggled back upright, looking in horror at the wet mess he’d made of Alfred’s suit.

“Alfred, I’m sorry…”

If the boy was expecting a sharp rebuke, it didn’t come. Alfred merely shrugged, wiped a few suds of the front of his shirt, and threw the sopping wet washcloth directly at Damian’s face.

 

Bruce had just reached the second-floor landing, still combing through his freshly slicked hair with his fingers when he heard a happy screech and a loud splashing sound. Curious, he opened the door of the bathroom. He quickly pulled it back shut as a spurt of water slapped against the door where his head had been half a second ago. He reopened the door, only a crack for protection. The bathroom was flooded, his son crouching in a half-empty bathtub and his butler kneeling in a veritable lake on the tiled floor.

“What’re you guys doing?”

“We’re taking a bubble bath, Master Bruce,” Alfred answered, water dripping from both sides of his mustache.

“Father, Father look, I’m Saint Nicholas.” Damian scooped a lump of foam from one of the walls and using it to give himself a magnificent white beard. 

Bruce nodded, letting his smile spread sideways. “So long as you’re both dry for the gala.”

Bruce retreated down the hall, feeling more relaxed than he had in a while. The happy water noises leaking from the yellow lit crack under the door behind him made the huge mansion feel smaller and cozier somehow.


End file.
